Chilean producer Petroquim is expected to restart operations of its 100,000 mt/year polypropylene (PP) plant in Concepcion, Chile, by August 3, after a maintenance shutdown that started on July 25, a company source told Platts Monday.
"We stopped the plant for maintenance because ENAP, our propylene's supplier, was having technical problems but by the the end of the week everything should be back to normality," said the company source.
The impact of the shutdown was 60-70% less volumes of polypropylene to offer to the export market on July and August.
"We built inventories and we are not going to have any problems to supply the Chilean domestic market but for the export side we are short and offering just for old costumers," the source added.
August Chilean offers to Peru and Ecuador went down $50-70/mt and they were heard around $1,850/mt CFR for homo and at $1,950/mt CFR for co-polymer.
For the Chilean domestic market, Petroquim dropped offer prices by $70/mt for August reaching levels of $1,900/mt CIF homo raffia, injection and film and at $2,000/mt CFR for random.
"The PP offer price reduction was a late reflection of the imports coming to the country last month and a tentative to be more competitive with the international finished products offers coming to Chile," said the source.
